After the War
by Mythical Otter
Summary: After saving the Gravity Falls Dipper and Mabel must return home. How does their life go after the summer they had? Please R&R.
1. Chapter 1

_**I own nothing!**_

The summer had been fun but they all knew it couldn't last forever, after all that was what started the whole weirdmageddon mess. Dipper sighed as he looked at the window at the last of Oregon zooming past. The California border was close, it felt like as soon as they go into California it's really all over. He knew he would miss it, the forest, the small town the adventures, his friends and family. Dipper didn't really have friends in Piedmont not like he did in Gravity Falls.

He glared at the faded sign that read 'Welcome to California!' so cheerfully almost mockingly. Just three more hours and they would be back to their boring suburb where nothing magical or fun ever happens. Mabel continued to sleep peacefully beside him with Waddles contentedly lounging on her lap. He was probably going to miss his Grunkles the most, they loved them very much and made sure the pig was coming. They paid more attention to them then their parents ever did, and Ford taught him so much. He looked at the letter Wendy had everyone in town sign the promise of next summer.

Three long boring hours later they pulled into the bus stop in Piedmont, California the stereotypical suburb. He nudged Mabel awake.

"We're here Mabes." she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and had a look of disappointment on her face, it broke his heart. They gathered their things and got off the bus, they looked around for their parents and found them waiting by the exit. They ran over, he wasn't going to lie he did miss his parents a bit. They were loaded into the car where Mabel took over the conversation. She told them about her summer romances, about Candy and Grenda, and about some of their adventures. She luckily left out the supernatural elements and omitted the monsters they fought and Bill. Dipper just stared out the window looking at the scenery so familiar yet not. It was the usual buildings, sidewalks, and busy streets that occupied the suburbs but after living in a small town surrounded by forest all summer it was so foreign...and loud.

They finally pulled into the driveway of their house, a plain white cookie cutter house like the rest of the block. It was so unlike the mystery shack, too clean, too normal. When they walked in the familiar smell of cooking hit his nose, after a summer of living with Stan who could barely cook, they were excited for some great food. He looked back at Mabel who was trying to slip upstairs as their mom was talking to her.

"Listen mom, can Dipper and I go unpack? You don't want us to leave our bags everywhere." she said convincingly, he was quickly grabbed and yanked up the stairs. They ran into their room only to find Dipper's stuff gone.

"Where's all my stuff?!" he yelled freaking out, his parents appeared in the doorway.

"Surprise!" his mom exclaimed. "You guys are teenagers now so we cleaned out your father's old office and made it into Dipper's new bedroom!" He looked at her in horror.

"Mom! But I'm fine sharing a room with Mabel, dad needs that office space." he tried to come up with reasons why they should continue sharing a room without flat out telling their parents that he couldn't sleep without Mabel there. His dad shook his head.

"You two need your spaces, you're getting older. Besides won't you be glad that all your clothes will be glitter free now?" Dipper looked at the ground before putting on a fake smile.

"You have a point there." he sighed, with that their parents left them alone yet again. He looked around, it was too open, too empty.

"Are you going to be okay Mabel?" he asked, he was concerned after the events that ended their summer. She nodded sadly.

"I'll be fine bro-bro besides I have Waddles!" She unzipped one of her bags and the pig jumped out, sniffing around. Dipper stared in shock, that's why his mom didn't freak out.

"You snuck him in? You realize it would've been easier to deal with it as soon as we got home." Mabel shook her head.

"They would've made me get rid of him!" He sighed, she was right.

"I'm going to go check out my room, call for me if you need anything."

He went down the hallway and stood in front of the closed door of his new room. He pushed it open and saw everything in place, even all of his books. He set his bags down on his bed, the room felt empty and dark. He pulled Wendy's hat off of his head and hugged it, if he closed his eyes he was back in the attic of the Mystery Shack. But reality was a cruel mistress he was still sitting here in a room not shared with his sister. He looked at the calendar pinned above his desk, there was a giant red circle for the first day of school next week. He wanted to rip it apart, school meant no friends, possibly being separated from his sister, and another year of torment. He grabbed one of his bags and began unpacking, he was glad he thought to wash his clothes before they left. He put everything in their drawers, as he walked back over to his bed he saw papers poking out of his bag. He ran over and saw they were photocopies of Journal 3 with a note that read. "You need these more than I do, never stop investigating it is up to you to unlock the secrets of Gravity Falls.-Ford" Dipper smiled widely before tearing off back to Mabel's room.

"Mabel! Mabel!" she opened her door, her room was already wrecked with Waddles sleeping in a pile of blankets.

"Why are you yelling bro? What's wrong?" she looked concerned, he must look half insane right now.

"Look!" he held out the journal pages so she could see them. "Someone copied the pages from Journal 3! Ford slipped them in my bag and told me that I need to continue his work." Mabel smiled and showed him her grappling hook.

"Grunkle Stan put this in my bag, he told me to keep being creative and weird." They hugged while smiling and laughing. Unfortunately his yelling attracted his parents, Mabel didn't close her door fast enough and their mom pushed in.

"Mabel Pines! You just came back and your room is already a mess!" she said irritated, just them Waddles decided to go check out this new person in the room. Their mom let out a shriek.

"Why is there a pig in your room?!" she tried to kick it but Mabel ran and grabbed him.

"This is Waddles! I won him at a fair during the summer!" she exclaimed holding him out. "We had lots of adventures!" Their mom sighed.

"You can't keep a pig inside the house we'll have to send him to a farm." Mabel started tearing up.

"But...we kept him inside at the mystery shack! He's a good pig!" Dipper walked over.

"He is really well behaved mom please. Let her keep him." His mom just walked out without another word.

The rest of the day was really uneventful, they unpacked, they ate dinner, and the twins hid upstairs. Around nine their parents insisted they go to bed, Dipper stood up and hugged Mabel.

"If you have a nightmare or anything I'm right down the hall. Good night Mabel." She squeezed him tight

"Same here, good night Dipper." He left her room and went to his own.

 _ **Hey guys this is a story that I came up with after the finale. I'm looking for a beta reader/ editor for future chapters, message me if you're interested.**_


	2. Chapter 2

**_So I finally got an editor on this chapter so I re-uploaded the better version. Please read and enjoy! I own nothing it all belongs to the devil aka Alex Hirsch._**

Dipper laid there unable to sleep, he never could sleep without Mabel snoring softly across the room. He was zoning out when an ear splitting shriek ripped through the house. Fast as lightning Dipper was in Mabel's room and by her bed. She was pale and sweating, her eyes were darting around the room paranoid.

"Always watching...Bill Cipher...Dipper…" She was whimpering and rocking on her bed, Dipper climbed onto her bed and hugged her.

"Shh we defeated Bill, we're safe now Mabel." he whispered, she squeezed him and sobbed into his shoulder. Their dad walked in.

"What happened?" he asked tiredly.

"Mabel had a nightmare." Dipper told him, their dad just shook his head.

"I trust you'll calm her down, I'm going back to bed." He left the room, Dipper glared at the doorway before going back to comforting Mabel.

"What if Bill comes back and tries to kill us?" she whispered sounding like a scared child, which she was.

"We erased him when we erased Grunkle Stan's mind." He assured her, she pulled back.

"But his memories came back, do you think Bill could have survived when we fixed Grunkle Stan's memories?" Dipper fell silent, she had a point. Even though they got rid of Bill by trapping him in Stan's mind and erasing it, they fixed his memories. Shards of Bill might reform, he smiled at Mabel.

"If he does come back we can just kick his butt all over again." he told her, she smiled and held up her fist.

"Mystery twins?" he fist bumped her.

"Mystery twins." He got off of her bed and ran to his room. He grabbed a pillow, his blanket, and a sleeping bag before returning to Mabel's room.

"Sleepover?" he asked, Mabel smiled brightly and nodded. He set up his sleeping bag right next to her bed.

"Good night Mabel."

"Good night Dipper." He heard her breaths even out and her gentle snoring return, he fell asleep soon after comforted by her presence. The week leading up to school was highly uneventful. Mabel eventually won the war to keep Waddles, they had gotten school stuff, and that was often found himself in Mabel's room organizing the journal pages while she talked with Candy and Grenda. After the summer they had this was like a death sentence, death by boredom.

It was finally the night before school, they decided to have a sleepover in Dipper's room that night. He tossed and turned for a good three hours before sleep finally took him. His mind was dark and dreamless as usual but then a flash of color caught his eye. He took form in his dream and he was standing in a forest, Gravity Falls. As he walked forward he kept seeing flashes of yellow in the trees, he ran into the pine forest. He followed the path of the flashes and ended up in a wide clearing. He looked around warily.

"Hey there Pine Tree!" Dipper jumped and spun around, floating there was none other than Bill Cipher.

"H-how?" He began backing away eyes wide. It was impossible; they destroyed him. Bill let out a laugh.

"Think again kid! You see it's all well and good to destroy me by erasing Stan's mind, but Shooting Star was persistent with getting it back."

"You became a statue! There's no way! This is just a dream!" Dipper refused to believe the demonic triangle. He ran past Bill and back into the forest, he had to wake up. After scraping his face on multiple tree branches he ran into something hard. Bill had teleported right in front of him.

"Trying to run, Pine Tree? Nice try... but it won't work. Once I get enough energy to spring this trap again I'll personally make sure that you, Pines, will meet an end." He grew and turned a dark red. Dipper gulped and fainted only to wake up in his bed, panting and sweating. He took in shaky breaths. He had to warn the Stans, but how? He looked over to where Mabel was sleeping with peaceful look on her face. She'd had nightmares all the time since that Weirdmageddon, but now he wondered how many of those were handmade by Bill trying to torture her. For the rest of the night he didn't sleep, so when the alarm went off he just shut it off and woke Mabel up.

They went through their normal morning routine, however there was a heavy air around the twins. Dipper looked like death and he couldn't get that dream out of his head. He knew Bill meant business. When he looked at Mabel, she had her fake happy face on, she must have been really nervous. He didn't want to worry his twin right before school so he decided he would fill her in on the dream when they got home.

Their mom dropped them off at their middle school, just like the rest of the town it looked too perfect, too urban. It made his chest pang as he imagined the schools back at Gravity Falls, old, run down, and just better in a way.

"You ready for this?" he asked Mabel adjusting his backpack.

"No." she said with a forced optimism. He held out his hand.

"Let's go." They linked hands and walked into the hell they were to be going to for the next nine months.


	3. Chapter 3

_**I fixed up chapter 2 and republished it!**_

Funny thing about school, it's never as fun as you remember it. Dipper remembered having lots of fun at the end of last year, but now he was desperately holding hands with Mabel, trying to avoid being pushed around by the hoard of students. They made it to their lockers and just stood there trying to breathe. Mabel had her ever optimistic smile plastered on her face, and Dipper envied her for that. His mind was whirring, _how was he going to contact Ford and how was Bill even strong enough to communicate?_ He heard Mabel scream and he jerked out of his thoughts.

"Dipper! Dipper! We have like three classes together!" She squealed loud enough to attract the attention of those walking past. He smiled.

"That's great Mabes, maybe this year won't be so bad after all." At least he had his sister to back him up. They ended up having second hour English, fifth hour Science, and seventh hour History together.

The bell rang, starting the stampede to get to classes. Dipper hugged Mabel and jumped into the sea of people to head to his first hour, film workshop. He stumbled into the room as the warning bell rang. Almost all the seats were taken, friends all chatting happily together, sharing stories of the summer. He knew no one as a friend, so silently he slid to a seat near the back and pulled out the binder he was keeping Journal 3 in. He was going to buy his own journal and pick up where Ford left off, but hadn't gotten around to doing it. Dipper flipped through the pages he had read hundreds of times sadly. He reached in his backpack and pulled out a small black light, he shined it on the copied pages hopefully. No glowing words or hidden codes appeared. He turned off the light and threw it in his bag, all those secrets were really gone. He slammed the binder shut and grabbed his notebook and pencil for class.

The day crawled by slowly, it was mostly introducing the class and getting to know everyone. The classes he had with Mabel made him relax a bit more but he was on edge nonetheless. When the final bell rang he let out a breath and quickly shoved everything in his bag. Dipper tapped his foot as Mabel gathered her sparkly pens and sorted them as she set them in her case. He was exhausted and more than ready to get home to start fixing their problem. The instant she picked up her backpack he was dragging her out to the parking lot to wait for their mom.

"What's the rush Dip-Dop?" She asked rubbing her wrist, he sighed.

"When we get home we need to talk and I need to do some things." That's all he was going to share while they were surrounded by dozens of other kids. Their mom pulled up and they raced to the car.

The way home was silent on Dipper's part, Mabel was talking all about how her first day back went. He stared out the window, his mind feeling numb and tired. It was nothing like when he would stay up for days researching. It was unpleasant, reminding him of when Bill took over his body. He jolted out of his thoughts when Mabel shook his shoulder.

"Come on bro bro."

He shook his head and jumped out of the car still feeling drained.

The moment they entered the house, Dipper was dragging Mabel up to his room. She jumped on his bed and rolled around.

"Home!" She exclaimed happily, Dipper sat down on the edge of the bed and took a deep breath.

"Listen Mabes I don't have good news...Bill's back." This caused Mabel to shoot up and stare at him with wide brown eyes.

"What?! There's no way! We beat him!" She yelled her voice taking on a tinge of fear. Dipper covered her mouth quickly fearing attracting their mom.

"I saw him, he entered my dreams."

"It was probably a nightmare." She said with a slight panicked laugh. It hurt his heart to break what little net of comfort she had thinking he was gone.

"It was the mindscape, I felt him, he was real." He was resigned to the knowledge that they would never truly be free of him. Her face fell and she curled up close to Dipper.

"Dipper, I'm scared…" She whispered with a whimper. Dipper sighed and ran a hand through her hair soothingly.

"I am too but we're going to beat him again I promise. I'll send a letter to Ford, he'll know what to do." _If I can find a way to get it there._ The how was going to be the death of him, as he didn't even know where the Stans were.

They sat in a tense silence for over an hour, until their mom called them down for dinner. As they walked he saw Mabel start building back up her bubbly shell. But a shell was all it was for her smile didn't reach her eyes, which were stormy and not the clear brown they always were. The mealtime conversation consisted of their parents talking about work and Mabel interjecting every now and then. Dipper had always been the quiet one so they didn't even glance his way as he just picked at his potatoes. He pushed his plate away, he didn't feel hungry.

"I'm going to go read." He told them as he fled to his room. He sat at his desk and pulled out some paper, he needed to at least try to warn the Stans. He quickly wrote a letter explaining everything and folded it up before sticking it in his backpack. He was going to call Soos and see if he had any ideas on how to get it to Ford.

He yawned and stretched, wondering why he felt so drained. He passed it off as back to school exhaustion and decided to take a shower. After he let the water warm up he slipped in and let the hot water envelope his body. Now that he was back in school he was going to have to shower way more often. The jets of water eased all of his tense muscles and made him even more tired. He turned off the water before he fell asleep and grabbed a towel. All his limbs felt like lead as he trudged towards his room, he slowly put on pyjamas and got in bed. The instant his head hit the pillow he was out like a light.

 _ **Sorry about all of the long breaks but as much as I love all of you I cherish my grades too. Updates will be spotty until I finish up school so please bear with me. Also I am working on setting up an Ao3 account and will be cross posting there, in later chapters I may move it over there all together but for now it will be on both. Enjoy the chapter and don't forget to R &R!**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Hello my Otters I'm back! I'm finally on summer break, I apologize for the sporadic updates but they should be more often know that I have time to write. Enjoy this chapter and don't forget to review! If you flame it will be ignored unless it's in pig latin. I own nothing!**_

He heard whispering all around him causing his eyes to fly open. He was laying in the clearing from his last dream. He quickly stood and got into a defensive stance his eyes scanning the treeline. He heard a voice come from the forest shrill with fear.

"Dipper! Dipper help! Please!" It sounded like Mabel. Before any rational thought could enter his mind he ran into the woods desperately calling out to her.

"Mabel! Mabel where are you?!" He was quickly getting lost, every tree blending together into a green film that took over everything.

"Dipper! Come on man! Help!" He heard a different voice slightly lower, Wendy.

"Dipper please! Help!" He heard Mabel's voice from the other side of the forest. He spun around as both voices called out in panic. Suddenly Ford walked out from behind a tree and approached him.

"You know you can't help them both. You're weak, useless, you can't save them." There was a cruel glint in his eyes. This wasn't the Ford that Dipper knew. In panic, Dipper slapped his hands over his ears. "This isn't real!" He yelled. "You are made by Bill and you don't control me!" He opened his eyes to see empty air where Ford was.

The forest fell silent as the cries ceased, the resulting silence pushing in on his ears. He slid through the trees silently not wanting to get caught off guard again. The color of the forest slowly drained to a dull monochrome. He felt his skin prickle as he heard the voice of Bill.

"Wow Pinetree you're getting good at this!" He said loudly, his voice was high pitched and annoying as ever.

"Why are you doing this Bill? What do you have to gain?" Dipper asked angrily.

"Oh you already know the answer to that kid." He floated so he was right in front of the teen.

"I want you and your family dead, and I might as well start by destroying the weakest link." Dipper grit his teeth.

"None of us are weak, you won't ever be able to beat us Bill!" He knew that if they stuck together then they would always come out on top. "You can't win!"

Bill floated up appearing to think.

"Oh I don't know about that one Pinetree but your relentless determination is amusing." Dipper glared at Bill.

"Don't forget Bill, you're still in my mind." He imagined an energy gun and began shooting at Bill. "I have ultimate control!"

"You keep telling yourself that Pinetree. Oh by the way you're going to be late." Bill disappeared and Dipper woke with a yell. He heard banging on his door.

"Dipper Pines get up right now! You are going to be late." It was his mom, he took deep breaths.

"Y-yeah coming mom." He answered tiredly. He quickly got dressed and pulled all of his stuff together. His body felt heavy, almost impossible to maneuver. It was a slow ride that left Dipper and Mabel racing to get to their first hours in time. He slid into his seat with less than a minute to spare. His head hit the desk, he was exhausted. During the lesson he struggled to stay awake as his teacher talked about how the first unit was going to go. He had gotten enough sleep but he felt like he had been up for days. When the bell rang he ran to a bathroom to find a mirror. He looked like a zombie, he was pale and had bags under his eyes.

"Bill…" he whispered softly. The dream demon was making sure he didn't really sleep, he was going to drive him insane. In his next hour he actually fell asleep, however the nap was short lived. His math teacher slammed a ruler on his desk loudly.

"Dipper Pines this is Algebra not nap hour!." She barked at him, he rubbed his eyes and went back to working on his assignment with bleary eyes.

For the next three weeks he fell into a pattern. Do homework, search for a way to block Bill's nightmares, sleep, be tormented all night, wake up feeling dead, and repeat. However about a week ago his trip to the library showed results. He read a book that said you can build dreamcatchers that work as barriers against nightmares. He had finally finished and he was eager to put it to the test. He got ready for bed and hung the dream catcher above his pillow before settling down to sleep.

He had a few hours of peaceful dreamless sleep before he was awoken by screaming, it was Mabel. He jumped out of bed and ran down the hallway. Mabel was still asleep but she was flailing around violently and screaming. Their mom was trying desperately to wake her up obviously scared for Mabel. He felt horrible, he should have known if Bill couldn't torture him he would go for his twin. He gently rested a hand on his mom's shoulder.

"Mom I know what to do." he said as he approached Mabel. He placed a hand on her forehead and thought really hard. He had found out they had a tiny bit of twin telepathy and he was relying on that right now.

"Mabel remember he can't hurt you, you have the power in your mind." Mabel gasped and sat up quickly crying. She saw Dipper and hugged him tightly.

"He said he was going to kill you." She sobbed out. He rubbed her back.

"I'm not going anywhere Mabes and you won't have anymore nightmares. I blocked his access to my mind so he attacked you." He admitted quietly. They had forgotten their mom was in the room until she spoke up.

"What are you two going on about?" She looked scared mostly for her children. Dipper didn't want to worry their mother with Bill so he thought up a quick lie.

"Just a game we play! The main villain is really terrifying so I can see how Mabel got nightmares nothing to worry about mom." He said with a smile, Mabel nodded in agreement. Their mom shook her head.

"Well then I'm going to go back to bed call if you need anything." They smiled at her and said in unison.

"Okay mom!" Dipper faced Mabel after she left.

"Did he hurt you? Are you okay?" She nodded.

"All he really did was threaten me and told me that he was going to kill the entire Pines family. But we're stronger than him right Dip Dip?" She said with a smile. He nodded and looked at the ground; to be honest he didn't know what they were going to do without their Grunkles.

Dipper gave Mabel his dream catcher and went to bed knowing that Bill was going to be back. But if it meant protecting Mabel he would suffer anything.


End file.
